PERSONA 5 ROYAL
You should see this JRPG in a crown
Bet you never saw this coming. Like Persona 3 FES and Persona 4 Golden before it, this is a massively expanded rerelease of a mainline Persona game with more characters, challenges and story elements added. That’s all well and good but we’re especially excited about one quality-of-life improvement in particular: you no longer have a strict bedtime enforced by your talking cat.
We jest, but only slightly – and Morgana still tells you to get an early night on important story days anyway. However, given what was already one of the biggest JRPGs on PS4 just got even bigger, you’re going to need that extra time in the evenings. Those after-school hours are prime time for packing in socialising and getting to know your Confidants, and Royal not only beefs up existing social links, it also introduces a few fresh faces.
Front and centre of this updated version is Kasumi Yoshizawa, a gymnastic prodigy who initially starts at odds with the Phantom Thieves before eventually joining their cause. Representing the Faith arcana, you’ll need to pay special attention to her; if you want to play Royal’s brand-new ‘third term’, which significantly extends the story past the point where the original game ends, you have to max out her Confidant rank before the middle of December during the in-game year.
THE GAME’S AFOOT
Another character you need to pay special attention to is an already-existing one whose storyline is having a significant overhaul for Royal: Goro Akechi. The floppy-haired ace detective’s Confidant rank no longer progresses automatically, meaning you need to seek him out yourself to build your relationship over time. He’s not the only pre-existing character the developers are having a second crack at, either: late-game party member Haru Okumura now has a greater presence in the story overall, and a number of boss encounters are being switched up.
That leads us to a second unfamiliar face in Royal: José, a young boy who appears only in Mementos. If you find a particular item in each palace and bring it back to him, he can craft snazzy accessories that bestow boss abilities on your party.
This isn’t the only buff you can enjoy in battle. With more powerful Shadows patrolling Palaces, you have an even better chance of downing enemies and instigating a Hold Up. On top of exploiting enemy weaknesses, Technical attacks (that is, whaling on an enemy inflicted with a status ailment) now results in a downed Shadow. Your navigator, Futaba, has her own All-Out Attack on top of all of the support abilities you can unlock by spending time with her in the real world. The rest of your fellow Phantom Thieves can also learn Showtime attacks that can be unleashed simultaneously.
ROYAL RUMBLE
The after-the-end story arc revises the original ending, not only offering fresh resolutions but a lot more besides. Naturally, we risk getting into spoiler territory if we go too deeply into the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of this additional scenario, but we can tell you it involves an all-new Palace with multiple never-before-battered bosses. We’ve already mentioned two of the three Confidants you need to reach max rank with for a shot at this new content; the third is bespectacled school counsellor Takuto Maruki. Making his debut shortly after the Phantom Thieves’ first successful heist, he’ll do much more than just listen to your problems…
We loved the vanilla version of Persona 5 (to the tune of giving it 10/10 back in issue 134) but the game being too short was definitely not one of our criticisms. All we’re saying is it took our staff writer three years to finish the original release; who knows what world we’ll be living in by the time she finishes Royal?
“ONE OF THE BIGGEST JRPGS ON PS4 JUST GOT EVEN BIGGER.”